Profile-Based Configuration Support

The Profile-Based Configuration Administration User Interface continues to be enhanced and built-out.

User storage of preferences can now be set to “Server” and changes to preferences will be stored using the userID (the setting was there in prior versions but was not activated until this version). Client IP instead of a text User ID can also be used but a warning will be displayed since this is unreliable in many network environments.

View setting for Tiles vs. Icons has also now been implemented, along with the ability to set the background color for the Tiles or Icons in the View.

The Help for Profiles Settings was completed (all settings now have help which has been updated to cover Profile mode). The help has been uploaded to the FlynetSoftware.com help folders. A future version will enable unzipping a local copy of the new Profiles help HTML folder to enable access in locked-down servers.

Some Track colors and status were not being properly set in Profile Host Connection settings during editing

CfgAdmin.htm has retry and reload attempts incorporated to accommodate being loaded as the Services are still starting in a fresh installation

NewHost and NewProfile Wizard Button locations for Previous and Next were made consistent regardless of visibility; the Next Button was moved to be grouped closer to the Previous and Cancel buttons to improve usability. When the page was very wide, the Next button wasn’t that easily located for a new user.

Profiles Configuration for AD Groups missing an editor button enabling selection from a list of available groups

Profile security for Groups access to a View made more reliable

FVTerm Web Terminal Emulation Feature

The View Menu presentation was improved for large numbers of host connections along with the Profiles mode enhancement of displaying Icons instead of Tiles for selecting a host connection.

Macro storage and retrieval is now more tightly associated with the active Profile name and Macro Application ID for the session. Active host name was being used, which could lead to confusion when managing multiple profiles that connect to the same host.

User Preferences can now be stored at the server-reducing reliance on cookies, as well as providing portability between devices for the same user

Websocket server-side cleanup made more efficient following a lost client connection.

SSH Library Initialization added to support dynamic new host definition that is part of the NewHost CfgAdmin setup configuration flow for SSH hosts

Added logging of text being searched for new host connect in trace mode

3270 Protocol-Specific Changes

Prior versions would change the cursor position inside an entry field so that it was on the last non-blank character. The cursor position will now stay as set by the host. This provides better support for host 3270 editors like ISPF

Rare circumstance caused duplicated data inside an entry field causing all subsequent fields to be skewed to higher positions on the screen. Discovered during global search and replace off a certain column position in the 3270 ISPF editor.

Setup and Installation

A new install is now defaulted to Profile Mode and creates the appropriate Profile and View files for a new setup

Setup now runs the CfgAdmin.htm page instead of Help at end of the Setup—if first-time install, will run in install mode, which will automatically run the NewHost and NewProfile wizards for the Host1 definition created by the setup. This includes additional prompts and assists to guide a first-time installer through the profile definitions and connection wizard.

The IIS Web Server service status is now checked at the end of the setup to ensure that the service is started and has a setting of AutoStart. If the status is Disabled, while it will be changed to AutoStart, a Popup warning will be displayed to the setup user as there may be a domain group policy that will continue to interfere with the IIS web service without an administrative change.

Recorder 2.0

A text scrubbing option has been added—Ctrl-H or Search – Scrub Text. Provides up to 10 search-replace pairs with assistance with cues to ensure the lengths of the search and replace text is the same.

Scrubbing form has a save/restore with a file name, so that multiple sets of scrub definitions can be saved and re-used.

By always using the same test subjects, the same scrub items (for example, social security numbers, names and other sensitive data) can be “fixed” easily and consistently.

Recording files were not being converted from the original log/trace format due to a months-old regression. This did not impact usability in Viewer Studio, but the recording files were much larger, as the conversion removes all the hexadecimal buffer records. A check was made so that no passwords will be included in the converted recording (any password attribute field is changed to “Pass” if changed). Without this fix, the text scrubbing would have left sensitive data in the hexadecimal buffers.

Profile-Based Configuration Support

The Profile-Based Configuration Administration User Interface continues to be enhanced and built-out.

New Host Wizard now works well with difficult connections, such as non-standard TLS ports and required Logical Unit or Device names (3270 or 5250)

Can now set Icon size for the FVTerm Page both for Standard and Touch devices

Can now set the location of the icons – top or bottom of the page

FVTerm Web Terminal Emulation Feature

A new print-screen icon has been added that queues the current screen for printing. For typical 24 row terminal sessions this enables 2-up printing of screen images on a single page as well as providing the user the ability to group multiple print screens as a single document. A user can click on the print-Queue icon multiple times—for the final screen, the standard Print Screen icon, when clicked, will print all queued screens along with the current screen in 2-up fashion in a single document.

Continuous refinement of Touch Client support and integration and configuration with the new Profiles mode. This includes better client management (with a new settings option) of the on-page touch keyboard for devices that have both a touch screen and physical keyboard.

Added swipe tabbing to touch devices—swiping left, right, up or down moves the cursor accordingly (left and right are backtab and tab if a long swipe, cursor left or right if short swipe, up and down simply move the cursor up or down in same column).

Continuous refinement of the FVTermParent.js and FVSessions.js Javascript API’s

For licenses with the Javascript API active, a new web page can be provided to users: Sessions.html, which is designed to make it easy for a user to have multiple sessions tiled in a single web browser view. This replaces the SCTerm.html page when users commonly have multiple sessions active and want them tiled together instead of in independent browser windows.

Clipboard Paste further refinements to support word-wrapping in fields that extend past the current row as well as pasting in a block when rows of fields line-up, as in a mainframe source editor.

Added Active Directory Group filter to Profile Views, which enables selecting the view a user sees based on that user’s group membership

Tightened connections of new websockets to allow retry in case of a race condition from the initial AJAX start of the session as well as more consistent setting of the userid associated with the session across all security options

Support for null characters in entry fields and unformatted entry screens fixed so that the user can key anywhere on a clear screen (instead of just the start of the first line) and nulls are not sent, only the non-null data. Clear screens are now full entry fields on the whole screen, and a user can key the command for the clear screen anywhere

Improved details for websocket logging to enable correlation between the client and server side logs

Added a UserControl option for websockets—if set to false will no longer ask the user if he or she wants to switch to AJAX following too many web socket errors

Added support for cluster sharing of Profiles as well as an auto-update / replication of profiles in a cluster environment

Server macros will now timeout after 5 minutes waiting for a user response at the client to a messagebox, form, or other input request. This was previously an indefinite timeout, leading to stranded threads, session connections and small memory leaks should the session be timed-out by the emulation service.

Administration Console – added configuration option for user-based licenses: Maximum Sessions Per User, which enables exceeding the licensed sessions-per-user value which is typically 3 or 5. This will not increase the maximum concurrent users, nor will it increase the total possible sessions. What it does is enable users to go-over the configured maximum if sessions are available. Assumes that not all users will be hitting the configured sessions per users, leaving sessions available for certain users that may need more than the configured number.

Clustered Servers can now sync with each other when Console User Security is active. Prior to any builds up to January 19, 2019, console user security would break cluster syncing for available sessions between the servers.

IBM Distributed Certificate Access Server (DCAS) RACF Single-Signon support implemented. A sample FVTerm Server Extension is available from Inventu—email support@inventu.com for more information.

TLS – SSPI Client Certificate searches of the Windows Certificate Store provide better diagnostics for when a certificate is not found

Clustered server IP Address configuration was lost under certain conditions during a version update of an installed server

Clustered servers, in a group of 3 or more were not synchronizing completely, related to a memory-leak fix in the last major release

ViewerLib: Added new version of HostConnection.GetSessionUser that will now optionally return the Profile that a user is connected with along with the active Host Name

ViewerLib: Added a new Static call HostConnection.GetLastEventLogEntry() which will return the text of the last event log entry written, to help in error reporting / recovery scenarios

ViewerLib: Added new static call GetDCASPassTicket which passes AppID, UserID and gets back the active mainframe userID and pass ticket for the user

If the Windows operating system restarts during an update install in-between uninstall of prior version and install of new version, the installation will now pick-up on the next execution of the setup as if it was a continuous operation. Prior to this fix, the registry would be in an uncertain state without multiple installs, with possible loss of host configuration details.

Simulated Host

The Simulated Host can now support non-FV emulators better, which can help when identifying differences between a customer’s terminal emulator and the Flynet emulation service during a conversion project.

Profile-Based Configuration Support

Introducing a whole new way to manage the definition and configuration of Host Definitions, configuration of the FVTerm Terminal Emulation Web Application and the new FVTerm Session Connection Profiles.

Accessed with the CFGAdmin.htm file found at /fvterm/macros/cfgadmin.htm

First Tab on the CFGAdmin now offers a checkbox Profile-based Connections which when checked and the Apply Changes button is clicked, will extract the information combined in the registry and the FVTerm web.config to populate the Profiles folder with a set of json files, one describing the Top View and then one for each host definition in the web.config

CFGAdmin.htm will then reconfigure with new tabs for

General SettingsProfile control–profile mode can be turned-off (it is not a one-way conversion)Run New Host Wizard Button
Run New Profile Wizard Button

Web Server
Interactive entry, selection and checkbox settings for most entries previously managed with direct editing of the FVTerm web.config file, with integrated help and dynamic feedback on changes and impact

Host Connections
Interactive entry, selection and checkbox settings for entries related to a host definition. Shares with the Administration Console in managing the registry settings, but in a far easier and dynamic format. A New Host Wizard is also available, which steps the administrator through the act of defining host connection details along with an interactive screen that connects and provides feedback on selections.

Web Terminal Emulator Profiles
A new definition, the Profile is based on a Host Connection Definition and provides many new attributes that used to be either globally defined in the web.config file, or awkwardly defined in web.config using a combination of underscores and other cryptic directives. In profile mode, the tiles a user clicks on to make a connection is now based on a profile instead of a host entry in the web.config. A New Profile Wizard makes it easy to create a new profile while seeing the feedback live of CSS, Font and other selections for a terminal emulation session.In addition to the Profile, a new Element, organized in a tree view and as tree-based folders, is the Profiles View, which provides the ability to organize multiple profiles inside of Views, which can in-turn contain other Views.Here is an example of the Profile Editor:

Tweaked keyboard unlock handling to handle rare cases where timing and arrival of buffers lost a screen update to the client.

Added logging of a TLS connection request from a host when TLS is required but not configured at the Viewer Server.

Subscription-based licenses now actively monitor the subscription status–updating the Administration Console status messages daily. Past versions only set the status on startup of the service. As many customers run their Viewer servers for months at a time, this could lead to a lack of correct information. Event log information and warning messages are also issued daily as the subscription approaches the anniversary date. If the subscription expires without an updated status (using FVLicense.exe to refresh the subscription), the number of available sessions will be reduced significantly until such time as the subscription is renewed and refreshed at the server.

FVTerm Web Terminal Emulation Feature

New startup of the client SCTerm.html page that no longer loads an aspx page into an iframe as part of initialization–it now calls a configuration AJAX-JSON call to pull all relevant configuration in a cleaner, faster approach.

When Profile mode is active, there Tiles in the Connection menu now can include both a View Folder as well as Profiles that the user can click-on to drill-down into a view folder or connect to a profile. To the user, the clickable Profile tiles look identical to the current (non-profile) Host connection tiles (more details below).

With Profiles mode, it is now easy to have multiple profiles for a single host, organized in a view specifically for enabling different Terminal Types (like 3270 43 rows by 80 Columns) so that users that need different terminal types have an easy way to connect.

A Profile View (including the “Top” or default View) can now specify that the icons in the bottom of the emulator screen can be a larger size for both touch and normal devices.

Profiles-based menu tiles now can have colors set in the Profile configuration–a View can have different tile colors than the default, and individual profiles can have different colors (both background and text).

In Profiles mode, on connection to a Profile, the cosmetic and other settings for the profile are loaded into the browser. User changes to fonts and colors are now per-Profile, not global. This enables different colors to be set easily for different connections / Profiles.

A New Multi-Session “Sessions.html” page is now provided as an alternative to the SCTerm.html page. This is only supported in Profiles Mode and provides an easy page for starting and viewing 1-4 Sessions, tiled or arranged based on the browser window’s geometry. The Sessions.html page saves a user’s selections making it easy to launch a set of sessions with a few clicks of a mouse.

Setup and Installation

FVTerm backups now backup with numbered backups, up to 5 files, so that customer changes are better preserved if the setup is run a number of times before recognition of a missing change.

The following modules are no longer installed by default but are generally available and can be provided on request: